NEI Small Reactor Forum Report – Part 1
The Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI) hosted its biannual Small Reactor Forum on February 25, 2014. The agenda for the one day event included six well-organized sessions with presentations from three small reactor vendors, the industry trade group, the regulatory agency, and several outside observers with a significant interest in the technology from a variety of perspectives. The slide show presentations are available from the conference archive page.
Of course, the slides only provide a hint of the content that was presented and discussed.
Perhaps reflecting the fact that there are far more conferences focused on discussing smaller reactors than there are small reactor construction projects, the event attracted a smaller than expected crowd. In a challenging economic environment, there are often fewer resources available to invest in projects where the payoff seems to be in the distant future than there are for projects with more immediate payoffs. Competition for attendees can be fierce when there is only a limited pot of money, most of the recipients have been already identified, and the near-term potential for increased resources seems dim.
Despite the disappointing attendance numbers, the event provided a worthwhile progress report on a number of tasks that must be accomplished in order to make smaller nuclear reactors a viable energy option.
Marv Fertel, the President and CEO of NEI, started off the conference with cautious optimism. He noted several significant challenges that are making it difficult to believe that now is great time to start new nuclear projects. He mentioned how the events at Fukushima have caused many to rethink the use of nuclear energy, how competition from low natural gas prices in the United States has helped to create a low priced electricity market where capital intensive projects have a difficult time, how a slow recovery from the economic recession that started in 2008 has created a period of slow electricity demand growth that has reduced the need for any new supplies and how renewable energy portfolio mandates have pushed additional generating capacity into a market that is already fully supplied, making existing baseload power plants uneconomical to operate.
He reminded people, however, that a seasonably cold winter has exposed the vulnerability of the natural gas supply infrastructure; during periods of intense cold, the system constraints have resulted in substantial price spikes. He pointed out the fact that electric power grids in the US and around the world have generally been better off when built on a diverse base of supply options and described NEI’s current initiatives to inform policy makers about the way that supply diversity can provide resiliency when certain fuel options are constrained by environmental or infrastructure considerations.
Even with those efforts underway, he acknowledged that economic considerations may result in a series of separate decisions to shut down as many as thirty of the existing nuclear reactors in the United States between now and 2035; most of those plants will be in the smaller, single unit category, but they are not the only ones that are economically challenged in the current environment.
He pointed out how the smaller reactor designs under development will provide a new option for utilities in order for them to be able to provide electricity for a growing population in an environmentally responsible manner. Because of the challenges facing existing plants, Fertel believes that small modular reactors are even more important today than they were four or five years ago because they may be available for rapid deployment in market-appropriate increments.
Fertel did not say this, but the logic seemed pretty clear. If (when?) gas prices rise more rapidly than expected or if (when?) gas demonstrates continued volatility because of demand variations, policy makers should realize that permanent decisions to shut down reliable baseload power plants were mistakes. If that happens, it would be useful to have an option to build smaller nuclear plants on a more responsive schedule than is possible for very large units.
NRC Commissioner Apostolakis followed Fertel’s introduction with a carefully non-committal brief about the efforts that the NRC has made to prepare for expected design certification applications that will use the existing regulations with few modifications. He described the effort that has gone into early discussions between reactor vendors and the Commission staff and the effort to slightly modify the direction given to license application reviewers by creating design specific review standards that take into account the unique features that each reactor vendor has proposed in order to meet the established general design criteria.
Not surprisingly for people who know his background, Commissioner Apostolakis spoke favorably about the possibility of the commission receiving and accepting certain new approaches that might rely more on a risk-informed analysis than on strict, one-size-fits-all application of numbers that were derived on an assumption that all reactors are large, producing approximately 1 GWe.
One specific number he mentioned that might be amenable to a risk-informed approach was the diameter of the emergency planning zone. He also stated that the NRC is ready to listen to design-based vendor proposals for control room staffing rules, response teams, and security staffing. He described, in general terms, internal discussions that are ongoing regarding the potential need for NRC inspectors at module fabrication facilities and a need to determine how manufacturing might affect the process of closing items left open in the design certification to be closed based on inspections, testing, analysis and acceptance criteria (ITAAC).
Dr. Pete Lyons, the Assistant Secretary of Energy for Nuclear Energy, described how the Administration recognizes the importance of energy diversity and the role of nuclear energy as a very low emission technology in the “all of the above” list of options. He emphasized the substantial amount of interest in SMRs that he has heard while on his international trips. He alluded to the fact that some of the countries most interested in building nuclear plants, including smaller nuclear plants, are countries with large domestic fossil fuel resources. He pointed out that they are realizing that they would rather use something else to produce domestic electricity so that they have more product to sell into the lucrative international market.
That might be something for the US to consider, especially as it invests in more capacity to export products like coal and natural gas and considers loosening restrictions on exporting crude oil.
Several characteristics of smaller reactors make them attractive around the world, including the fact that they are a better fit for smaller grids and the fact that they have a good potential for air cooling in places where water resources are limited. The DOE recognizes that the economics of smaller reactors will not work unless vendors are able to assemble a large enough order book to encourage investment in the factories that will enable the economy of mass production to overcome the disadvantage of smaller unit sizes. Building just one or two units would be a failure of the vision. As a rough measure of the potential scale of the program, Dr. Lyons threw out a figure of 50 GWe from smaller reactors in the US in the next several decades, but he added a number of caveats that admitted that the number was still just a guess at this point.
Dr. Lyons described the DOE’s program to support the design and technical licensing evaluation of two specific design options and described how it is modeled after the Nuclear Power 2010 program. Dr. Lyons was quite proud of the impact of that program, calling it a great success. The “bumper sticker” on the slide describing the SMR program, which was legislatively limited to two recipients, stated “The U.S. Government wants to support the safest, most robust SMR designs that minimize the probability of any radioactivity release.” Here is how Dr. Lyons described the selection process.
At the moment, we have the two awards that have been announced, B&W mPower and NuScale. Certainly we had outstanding applications. We had a number of applications from US companies. It was a tough competition, a very tough competition. We used quite a range of different tools in finally coming up with identifying the successful candidates in those solicitations. You might find it interesting, even though we were required to have only an internal government panel, which we certainly had, we also used a number of private, unbiased individuals to also review the application. So we had a variety of different reviews of the applications in order to make this very, very difficult decision but B&W mPower and NuScale came through on top of those two procurements.
Aside: That part of Dr. Lyon’s presentation provides some context for a comment that Pierre Oneid, Senior Vice President & Chief Nuclear Officer Holtec International, made later in the day. Holtec was not one of the two vendors chosen, but Oneid stated that the company does not really want DOE’s money as much as they want their stamp of approval. There is a strong undercurrent of feeling that the DOE small reactor program was specifically — and inappropriately — designed to anoint the government as the selection body for the winners and losers in the race to build smaller nuclear reactors. End Aside.
In response to a question from the audience, Dr. Lyons indicated that there is no current plan to ask for any additional money or to issue any additional funding opportunity application processes.
Despite the discomfort that many Americans have with the idea of the government selecting winners and losers, I am starting to come to the conclusion that nuclear energy might be an exception. Standardization provides a number of economic benefits, but leaving the decision to “the market” eliminates many of those benefits for a technology with the kind of long lead times associated with nuclear technology.
There was a lot more to the conference, but this post is already long enough. I will cover the rest in a separate post.
The “winners” seem to be pressurized water reactors exclusively.
That’s true, but that feature was essentially decided before the competition even started. I’m not necessarily defending the decision, but without a radical rewrite of existing rules, or a substantial investment by a vendor of a different option, light water reactors seem to be the only nuclear technology that can be licensed in the US within the next decade.
I think the current regulatory paradigm (I hate that word) with a relatively large staff exhaustively evaluating a particular design would preclude a “let the market decide” approach.
On the bright side, SMR components may be more amenable to additive manufacturing, 3-D printing technologies for realizing cost reductions. Currently these processes have only been demonstrated with a limited number of materials such as resins and some powdered metals. Production of nuclear grade components by such processes would be an interesting research project.
Overall this is a very well done snap shot of the current situation, including Fertel’s comments and assessment. I still see it boiling down to a catch 22, and I don’t mind assigning the blame (from my comfortable seat at my computer). The NRC can’t approve a new design without an application. A vendor can’t submit an application for NRC certification without completing the design engineering. Just how far does anybody realistically think these vendors can go on the engineering to complete the design on their own nickle? The problem rests right on the shoulders of the nuke utilities; nobody will commit to buy one. Yet they all bemoan constantly the upgrades new information (Fukushima) is forcing on the old designs, bemoan old designs are not competitive in some markets, and will soon be looking at license extensions for the old designs beyond 60 years. Hey, get a clue, your old designs days are numbered. You better be thinking forward if you are committed to nuke power. You better be working in parallel with running your old designs to get their replacements certified and built. Start ordering SMRs. The other problems are fluff, the USA can engineer an SMR, NRC can certify the design in a timely manner with the right pressure (indicated by Commissioner Apostolakis). The catch 22 will not be broken until utilities commit to buying new designs. Including the AP1000. mjd.
“… but leaving the decision to ‘the market’ eliminates many of those benefits for a technology with the kind of long lead times associated with nuclear technology.”
For reasons I discussed elsewhere here at Atomic Insights, neither a purely free market (which historically has never existed in any country at any time) nor socialism (which has always failed everywhere it has been tried), is the solution. A free market restrained by sensible government regulation and the moral voice if the Church is the solution. That’s the three legged stool. Remove one leg and the stool falls over. See Pope Leo XIII’s Quod Apostoloci Muneris and Rerum Novarum. The lessons of the 19th century apply even – especially – in our technological 21st. Nuclear will be successful when we have sensible balance.
Not quite for the entire conference. Transatomic Power apparently was the only non-LWR folks at the meeting to have a presentation; it did one on their MSR which appears to be interesting:
http://www.nei.org/CorporateSite/media/filefolder/Conferences/SMR/DewanSMR2014.pdf
Transatomic has a more detailed white paper on their website:
http://transatomicpower.com/white_papers/TAP_White_Paper.pdf
I’d love to see the folks involved with the NGNP present at a meeting like this as to what’s going on in their neck of the woods. It seems to be quiet up in Idaho.
@Dave:
Dr. Dewan spoke as part of the session titled “Closing the Fuel Cycle: The Strategic Role for Advanced Reactors.” She was not the only non-LWR presenter; Eric Loewen of GE-Hitachi also spoke about the PRISM reactor as part of that session. Jessica Lovering of the Breakthrough Institute also discussed the attractiveness of including discussions about new and improved reactors as part of the conversation about nuclear energy as a major tool in addressing energy and climate challenges.
This part of the forum was quite interesting because it reinforced what I believe is a strategic shift for NEI. As described in the Atomic Insights post about NEI’s “Future of Energy” campaign, the organization has begun more openly supporting discussions about changes in the fuel cycle in relation to addressing the issue of used nuclear fuel.
There appears to be more appetite today for talking about the material as a future resource instead of allowing it to always be characterized as a burden on future generations that we need to solve now before we can develop and deploy the modern reactor technology that is available and licensable for construction without significant regulatory development.
Who is the market for these?
I can envision a remote mining operation that needs electricity and / or steam being a customer. It would be mining a rare and precious commodity to justify the enormous capital expense.
A lot of coal plants are closing. This would appear to be a natural opportunity. A lot of the existing electrical infrastructure could be saved. Electric utilities are the industry in this country with the highest capital investment. However, even if these things were ready for market I doubt the regulator would allow this.
The economy of scale allows big nukes to be built since they can pay for all the items required for regulation. How could small nukes be economical unless there were multiple nukes at one site? At that point, you are better off with the big units.
Are the rules going to change to allow these to economically work?
Are the rules going to change to allow these to economically work?
That is the big question. The NRC recognizes that the SMRs and non-LWR plants perhaps need a different set of rules. The NRC has identified several areas that need to be looked at. See link here:
http://www.nrc.gov/reactors/advanced.html
And here:
http://www.nrc.gov/reactors/advanced/policy-issues.html
From the second link, you can see the list (right now) is rather long, and could well become longer. Whether the NRC has the staffing and motivation necessary to address and resolve these issues, is anyone’s guess.
I’m not following some of what you say. You said “I doubt the regulator would allow this”; who’s the regulator in this case? If the unit is ready for market the NRC has approved the design. And it is well established that it is easier with the NRC to add units to an approved site than start from scratch on a new site. Do you mean state utility commissions? Virtually all of the Southern states in the USA, currently with a nuke, have adopted the “pay if forward” rate structure for new nukes; I think they like nukes. But this can get complicated by state governments passing “renewable” goals. As far as who is the market, you don’t see a utility with an aging 800 Mwe nuke unit to be a market for four SMRs (multiple on one site)? The problem is nobody knows the cost of an SMR yet. And that cost will be dependent on total units sold. Right now the USA market has shown the only new design anyone is even willing to chance is the AP1000, so all market eyes are on those units. And that cost answer won’t be available until one hits 100% power with all testing passed. Your economy of scale argument is only true once the nuke is bought and paid for. History shows virtually every nuke brought on-line since late ’70s, is 2-3 times estimate on cost and several years late. That’s where economy of scale breaks down. I think SMRs can break that trend. But it won’t happen without commitments now.
I guess I’m guilty of speaking too soon, judging titles of presentations without reading all of them completely Thanks for pointing out my error.
@mjd
I’d say nuclear looks pretty “beloved” in northern states as well?
http://investigativereportingworkshop.org/investigations/nuclear-energy-lobbying-push/story/nuclear-lobbying-turns-states/
Southeastern States still have monopoly providers for production and distribution of electricity in state-regulated service areas. I’d say the difference is that in the Southeast, they are still fond of anti-consumer laws (such as CWIP), and nuclear is a non-competitive option for getting a good chunk of change from the ratepayer (and paying none of the premium for risk or capital). And when you have cost-overruns, as you likely will, it’s consumers who get stuck with the tab (e.g., Levy County or Vogtle). If nuclear can’t compete in any other way (and with energy technologies that can be built in 1 – 2 years, and fully cover capital costs in 10 to 20), I don’t see where this option expands much in the future. Unless you have captive ratepayers as they appear to have in the Southeast. Liking nuclear has little of anything to do with it.
It certainly would be nice to burn used fuel somewhere to reduce its radioactivity and get the full energy content out of it. The PRISM and the Transatomic concepts might help this in time.
I know that the CANDU “can do” DUPIC, but don’t think it deeply burns the used fuel in order to do so. However, it is available now for licensing and perhaps it could be used to burn up more than it is presently advertised to do. Any insights as to the CANDU’s capabilities – if any – to thoroughly burn spent fuel?
@EL. You make some valid observations. My point was the state rate commission rules are still controlled by the individual state legislatures. Last i checked a couple years ago, virtually every southern state with a nuke had the pay it forward rate structure for new nukes. Not so up north. Things may be changing, I’ll read your link later, thanks. There is recent press in FL that things may be changing there too, but most of it just looks like finger pointing right now. Most of what I read about Levy Co indicated a large part of the high estimated cost was due to new infrastructure for new interconnections to hook it to the grid. Makes one wonder; that requires a lot of real estate transactions.
I’ve found papers with numbers such as an additional burnup of 18,000 MW-d/MTHM for DUPIC. This is only a fraction of the original burnup in an LWR, but considerably greater than normal CANDU fuel figures.